


John 3:30

by Davechicken, shesgottheknife



Category: Supernatural
Genre: AKA not permanent, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, M/M, Religious Themes, Supernatural-style-death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-16
Updated: 2014-01-16
Packaged: 2018-01-08 23:17:18
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,772
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1138632
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Davechicken/pseuds/Davechicken, https://archiveofourown.org/users/shesgottheknife/pseuds/shesgottheknife
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>John 3:30 - He must become greater; I must become less.</p><p>"Cas, you love God. God loves you. He brought you back. Did it occur to you that maybe he did this so you could be the new sheriff upstairs?"</p>
            </blockquote>





	John 3:30

I never really cared that much for running. But lately, it seemed I'd been doing a lot of it...

I heard Castiel's voice crying out for my help as I skittered around the corner just in time to see Abaddon shoving the blade into his stomach. I cried out for him, my angel. It never got any easier. In fact, I think it got harder and harder each time. 

A smirk erupted into laughter and the evil bitch was gone, her minions in tow. My knees hit the ground hard as I scooped Castiel into my arms, holding him tightly to my chest. 

My angel. My brave little soldier. A fighter to the last breath. A rebel to the end. How many times must he die?

***

Castiel and I lay in a bed that neither of us needed for its intended purpose. I was surprised he'd agreed to work with me, even more surprised when - of his own free will - we ended up tangled in the sheets (and each other) for going on two years now. It happened out of nowhere, but then it kept on happening, and there was no denying either of us loved it, either.

Right now he was sated and spent, warm and content. He was curled up on me, hand drawing lazy circles on my chest. I squinted down at them, wondering if there was some hidden meaning to the bee-lines he drew, or if it was just an echo of the planets spinning around the sun. Sometimes we would talk about our theories on God, or the Winchesters, or what we wanted to happen with Purgatory. Sometimes we’d talk about nonsense like what was going on with the world at large, but I think my popular culture references occasionally sailed over his pretty hair. Still, he would always listen when I spoke, and I would always be there for whatever troubled him.

(Occasionally, of course, frustration would get the better of us and there’d be yelling and shoving and so on before we were calm enough to talk things through… but even that was a connection of its own. We both had needs. We both had them filled.) 

"Why do you think I've been given so many second chances… am I making the right decisions?" Castiel asked me quietly.

Asked the King of Hell. Me. Asked the leader of the damned if he was holy or not. The irony was not lost on me. Even now - in flagrante with the devil - he worried about the _right thing_ and he thought enough of me to ask...

"God's boundless mercy, o'course," I answered. " _On me_ ," I added with a chuckle. "Honestly, Castiel, why do you care so much for a God you believe has vacated the premises? Never once let you look on Him. I mean, what kind of God does that?"

"Crowley," he said sternly, as though he were scolding a child instead of one as old I was. Even if he only knew the half of it. "You shouldn't talk about God like that. He created you, too, you know?"

"Yes, yes, and Heaven and Hell and blah, blah, blah. I'm aware, kitten. I did read the Cliff Notes."

Castiel propped himself up on his elbow and looked at me with a grin. "What do you think God's doing, anyway?"

"Probably holed up in some tiny hut on a beach, sipping fruity cocktails and hitting on the pretty waitresses."

"Don't be so blasphemous, I was asking seriously… why did He disappear? What's the point in all this?"

"... _'For I know the plans I have for you,' declares the Lord, 'plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future._ ' Jeremiah 29:11. He's got a plan… probably a pretty awful one, but that's more than most of us can say, isn't it, love?"

Maybe I shouldn’t quote chapter and verse. Maybe it gives too much away, shows too many of the cards in my hand. There’s not many I’d let hear me wax lyrical with holy testament. What’s the saying, though?

**The devil can cite scripture for his purpose.**

The Angel of Thursday seemed content with that answer and the conversation moved to nonsense once more. I heard every word he said, but my mind drifted backwards, to the day I offered him the deal in the first place. Honestly, I should’ve known he’d agree to it… but still I had hoped in the back of my mind he wouldn’t.

But he accompanied me to Hell and heard what I had to say, taking the deal, blinded by power he thought he needed.

He hadn’t needed any of it. But he wasn’t to know that at the time, now, was he.

***

Castiel was not one of the first angels to be created. The first were the four: Michael, Lucifer, Gabriel and Raphael. The archangels were brilliant in their radiance and glory, but never had four more different brothers existed.

That was not to say that the other angels were any _less_. Unlike Lucifer imagined, a being’s worth was not limited solely to their power, strength or light. Humans were no less beautiful than angels, and seraphim were no less beautiful than the archangels.

Even back then, Castiel was something of the odd one out. Where his brothers and sisters were caught up solely in their duties or in themselves… Castiel would be the one with his head tilted to one side, curious, wondering.

His curiosity never got in the way of him carrying out his duties, though. He was a good soldier, loyal, unwavering in his faith, strong… his inquisitive nature allowing him to see things others didn’t: an expert strategist.

He stuck to the endgame, to the goal, but how he got there was always different. Castiel saw outside of the boxes he’d been placed into.

It was why he was special.

***

The Tablets were never supposed to be discovered. But - of course - humanity is curious. If something existed, leave it to them to find it. The discovery of the Angel and Demon Tablets was enough to change _everything_. I needed them in **my** hands. _I_ needed that power, that ability to control the gates of Heaven and Hell. _It belonged to me_. The demons (Crowley loyalists at least) agreed with me on this. 

Naturally, everyone thought the Tablets belonged to **them** , so it was a race to find them, you see. Between context clues, reading people, and - of course - the Angels on my payroll, I deduced that Castiel had _never_ actually let go of the Tablet. He was a smart cookie, my angel. Always was different from the rest. I had no choice. I didn’t want to cause him pain - I _never_ wanted to cause him pain - but I had to get the Tablet back into my hands. And sometimes the ends, the means - you know the saying.

It seemed the least painful way was by creating a small hole with the colt in my hands, the bullet made specially for him. Bullet with his name on. And if it was the only one with his name on, then he would be safe... My hand pushed into the flesh of his vessel. My fingers hit the hard rock of the Tablet immediately - how could they _not_ \- but I didn’t remove it right away. I could feel his Grace - **Heaven** \- swirling around my fingers as I moved them closer to it. Blood and viscera mixed with the holy spark that was _him_. It was so very… _Castiel_ , a mixture of the sanguine and divine. He really was the most human Angel of them all. He always had been. 

The warm sloshing of the entrails as I pushed them around was almost comforting. I felt an odd sense of pride knowing I was the only one to touch him in such an intimate way as his Grace coiled almost lovingly around my hand. I finally pulled the Tablet from him. He’d be fine. He could easily remove the bullet and heal himself. And with that thought, I disappeared. I didn’t wash the blood from my hands immediately. It was almost as if he was there with me, like he used to be. And truth be told, _I missed him_.

There were other things to arrange, as well, I told myself to keep my mind from lingering. From remembering other times I had been inside him, or him in me. I also needed the Prophet to translate the Tablets. But it was all a ruse. I knew what they said. But I also knew what it would look like if I had the Tablets in my possession and pretended not to care what was on them - or if I let on that I _knew_.

And so I sought out Kevin Tran.

***

Angels Fall for all sorts of reasons. Everyone knows the story about the _first_ fallen, of course. You would have to be a moron not to have heard.

Lucifer. God’s brightest. The Star of Morning. The Light-Bearer. The Shining One. He blazed through the firmament like a comet, dazzling to behold. His voice echoed through Heaven when he sang, and all the little fledglings gazed up at him in awe.

It was obvious he was going to Fall. For all he loved God, Lucifer loved himself more. He took all that light and beauty to heart, and when he was asked to serve, he thought himself better. He thought himself _greater_. And for all he swore it was love of God that caused his Fall… it was love of Lucifer, instead.

No one else quite approached the **intensity** of Lucifer, though many erred or faltered. Some were merely locked away for eternity, and some left the peace of Heaven for the ruckus of Earth. Such were the Gabriels, the Balthazars. They made the other mistake. Instead of hating humanity and loving themselves, they hated where they had come from and wanted to _be_ the very thing God had set them to look after. Their rebellions were ones of irresponsibility.

Castiel? 

Castiel’s sins were different again. Different and plentifold. But they weren’t always sins…

***

Which brings me to the whole apocalypse thing. It _had_ to happen, naturally. It had been foretold by prophets for years and years. Destiny… fate… _Big Plans_. Perhaps it was, indeed, a prophecy. But it was just that. A vision one man saw of things to come that - if left unchallenged - would, in fact, become reality. Enter an unruly angel and two denim wrapped nightmares, and everything goes topsy turvy… I do love a good plot twist, after all. 

Team Free Will was at it again, changing fate, challenging everything, keeping things _interesting_.

At least, that’s how I justified the whole mess in my head, as the King of Hell. People were curious and looking for answers. As their King, they expected an explanation: that’s what I gave in my _If I were God_ speech.

Because, really, how did you explain things? It had been the End Game for so long. Well. Heaven’s End Game. And everyone down in Hell just assumed that it was what was going to happen. 

Hell. A lot of them had been Lucifer loyalists, you know. A Hell of a lot of them (no pun intended) and they saw it as much as _his_ final victory over God. You know. Pitch and brimstone and all that. Sin and despair and the end of times and the day of the beast and all souls in their final resting place in the celestial game of ‘Musical Chairs’. 

But it didn’t happen. Lucifer - the very _reason_ Hell existed in the first place - was locked up in a nice little trap (with some help from yours truly) and suddenly the whole of existence was an open playing field again.

Suddenly there was a whole brave, new world for the taking. 

And I took it. I did.

“I am your King,” I told them. 

It was time for a New Hell. A Hell without Lucifer. It was time I put things straight.

***

It wasn’t intentional. Not in the beginning. Castiel was passionate about causes he felt dearly about and more than once he had me pinned up against the wall in a spat of anger. I had such love, such adoration in my heart for him, I didn’t stop him when he pressed his lips against mine. It was different from the Deal’s kiss. This one was driven by emotions and feelings, and I didn’t want it to stop. He pulled back - I believe he startled himself - and I grabbed the back of his neck, tugging him back to me for more. 

That was the moment it got… _complicated_.

Not like there was any precedent for this, but it seemed a bit wrong… God’s favourite angel and the King of Hell? Then again… who was it that defined right and wrong, anyway? New precedents could always be set. God was no longer accepting houseguests, and Castiel and I were the highest moral authorities (if you ignored Raphael, and let’s face it everyone wanted to.)

And so set they were as my teeth scraped along his neck, my fingers down his chest, my lips trailing airy kisses all over his vessel. The two of us, moving as one, and we were glorious. A fine line between right and wrong, though. 

We walked it carefully. And frequently. My own mind wondering what _exactly_ I was doing with an angel. Castiel’s mind wondering just what the Hell he was doing with a _demon_.

Nimble fingers wrapped around my length bringing me back to the present. Despite the doubts we both had, neither of us could deny we both loved this pleasure, these… _sins of the flesh_... and neither of us wanted to stop.

There were promises whispered more than once in the heat of the moment, promises I knew would be broken… not be me, of course - I keep my bargains - but I let myself believe them. I let myself believe that things would be different… that free will would not fuck me over. 

_Bollocks_ , was I wrong.

***

Castiel peered at the fish, gasping for breath, floundering on the edge where the sea met land. There was oxygen in the water. Food, too. He squinted down at it, wondering why it was doing this. It had a perfectly good life if it just stayed where it was. It could continue to be a fish and could produce offspring and fulfil the course of its life.

But instead, here it was, gasping and struggling to adapt to the land instead. Castiel wondered if he should try to lift it and push it back into the water. His true Form would burn the flesh from the bones, but perhaps he could find some way to use a branch or blow gently until it rolled back into the water? Wouldn’t that be a mercy?

“Don’t step on that one,” came a voice from behind him, and Castiel looked up to see Lucifer. His brother was radiant and glorious, his voice a rumble that shook the ground. “He’s got plans for that one.”

Castiel squinted at it. Inch by inch, it dragged itself out of safety and into something new. The fish wanted more. The fish wanted to _be_ more. 

It was a subtle rebellion, but apparently one He approved of, if He had plans for it.

The seraph watched the fish, and all the fish’s descendants, and all the children of man.

***

Honey. Of all the things… _Honey_. My rebellious little angel was straight out of his gourd, and what did he offer me?

He prefered insects to angels these days, and that means the little ziplock baggie of buzzy-juice must have meant a _lot_ to him, and it shook me. I don’t think those two fools were smart enough to realise how it affected me, but it did. Maybe Meg did. She was dumb, too, but a demon at least. I like to think that demons - having been around longer - are smarter, but in reality they are just the same as they were in life. There’s no making a silk purse from a sow’s ear, you know.

Honey.

It was hard to tell how much he remembered, because the look in his eyes was not all there. It hurt. It hurt to see the missing pieces. When he came back, he didn’t come all the way back. Part of him didn’t want to. Part of him resisted. Part of him wanted to stay dead.

I didn’t take the gift he offered to me, because it would have said too much. He offered me life in its simplest, most beautiful form. My angel has always understood the wonder of the garden, I suppose. He’s always been one to wander through life.

But right then, he was not my angel. Not really. There was still too much of him that was gone.

And I was still royally pissed off with him. 

You can’t say I don’t have pride, too. Because I do. 

I wondered what it would take to bring the old Castiel back. It’s something I was going to have to find out.

***

“God has a mission for you, Castiel,” said Zachariah. 

The seraph stood attentively, waiting for his charge. Although he tried to conceal it, he brimmed with hope, love and pride. He had tried his best to be the angel God needed of him, he had served with a full heart and an open mind. Although God never spoke to him directly, he never presumed that He should.

Castiel was a lowly soldier, a servant, and it was his glory to serve God.

“God needs you to go into Hell,” the other angel explained. “And retrieve the Righteous Man.”

That made Castiel startle. An angel? In Hell? That was unheard of. Only one angel had ever been in Hell, and that was Lucifer himself. He hesitated, frowning up at his superior.

“Castiel…”

“Why?”

“Because God wills it, Castiel. That is why.”

“But why is a Righteous Man in Hell?” he asked. “Surely God Himself died for sins to be forgiven.” 

“You do not need to question His will. Only do as He commands.”

Castiel frowned. He had thought that God’s will would make sense to him. He was but a lowly seraph, it was true, but he’d seen the beauty of God’s creation, the wonder of life and love… he’d witnessed the world in all its broken glory, and he’d sung rapture on high in His name.

He’d never expected the _calling_ to be something so strange. So… unlike the God he knew. But who was he to second-guess? No. He would do as he was bid. 

So Castiel blazed down into Hell. Filled with pride at being chosen for the task, he stretched out his wings and he flew as hard and fast as he could. 

Hell was horrible. Everything that Heaven was not, Hell was. Where Heaven was peace and joy, light and love? Hell was the sound of people screaming beyond the limits of a body’s meaty frame. Hell was the smell of death, decay and all things rank without the hope for rebirth. Hell was dark and it cloyed at him, it reached for him, and Castiel shuddered in agony as a thousand tendrils and claws pried at him. 

When he found the Righteous Man, Castiel could recognise the good in him, but the human’s face was warped and broken. He ached in sympathy, seeing how twisted this human had become. He was no demon - not yet - but it was surely only a matter of time. And all demons had been human, once. 

Feeling rage towards a world that could hurt a creature so, Castiel wrapped his arms around the man and pulled him free from the chains that bound him. Agony crippled the body, and Grace moved to pity wiped him clean. Furious, Castiel bore the Righteous Man aloft.

He laid the body in the Earth, and he watched and waited. He had poured his love and his light into the man, and now he had to wait for him to return.

And when he did, the Earth shook with his cry of jubilation. Dean Winchester was saved.

***

“I just do not understand,” Castiel said, perching on one of the least-bloody parts of my laboratory. Not that it mattered. No grime would ever dare to attach itself to his vessel or his clothing. Castiel would not permit it, and - even if he had - I would not.

“What, darling?” I asked, wiping ichor from my hands fastidiously. “There’s a lot of things for you to not understand, in the grand scheme of things.”

But this was one of those times he truly needed to confess, I could see. I could tell by the way his brow creased. From the way his lips thinned. From the way he stopped breathing. My angel has always been one for drama, in his own way. And I can read him. I can. I can see things in that otherwise-inscrutable face. It’s why he came to me with these worries, and not to Dean. Not to his _human_ friend. Profound bond or not.

“Why He no longer cares.”

Ah. God again. God and Dean Winchester between them are responsible for the most mercurial of moods.

“How can you say He doesn’t?”

His blue eyes glinted at me, and I could almost see the spark of divine Grace when they did. This was a touchy subject, after all, but he was the one who broached it.

“We undid His plan. We unmade the Apocalypse.”

We. He included me in there, along with the brothers. It touched me, I’m not ashamed to admit.

“So?”

“It was His _plan_.”

“You only _think_ it was His plan.”

“It was written, Crowley. It was foretold.”

“Yes, well. Perhaps He changed His mind? Or maybe He was giving some vague stage directions but He doesn’t mind some improv? Or maybe He wanted _this_ all along?”

An angel and the King of Hell. Working together. Stranger things…

“He no longer cares,” Cas insisted, staring down at his feet, but I knew he wasn’t looking at his footwear. Not really. “About anything. I know.”

“Oh? You do, do you?”

“Yes. Joshua told me.”

“Right. And you believe him because--?”

“I believe him,” Cas said, simply. “I used to think I was doing His will. I used to think He had a plan. I used to believe He loved us all. But I rebelled and was brought back.”

“So He _must_ care, then.”

“No. I rebelled. I should have been punished. I should not have been brought back to do the wrong thing again.”

“I could punish you, if it would make you feel better,” I offered. “Bend you over my knee. Spank you. Tell you what a bad little angel you’ve been…”

Castiel glowered at me in his whole ‘holier than thou’ way and I shrugged it off like it was a joke.

“Offer’s there, kitten.”

“I don’t know why I am even telling you…”

“Because,” I told him, “we’re partners.”

“Business partners.”

A lie. I ran my tongue over my lips and remembered the taste of him. Salt on skin. I remembered the sound of my name drifting from his tongue. I remembered lots of things.

“C’mon, Cas. If you were God, would you still be watching every last thing that went on? If you were omniscient, omnipotent… you’d already have seen everything.”

“But that would negate Free Will.”

“Just because He’s already seen something, doesn’t mean it wasn’t a choice. Knowledge of something doesn’t mean you were responsible for it. Not really. I know that you have atrocious fashion tastes, but I’m not _responsible_ for the horrific way in which you wear your tie.”

“He never answers when I call.”

“Why should He?”

Cas blinked owlishly up at me, as if I had asked ‘What is air?’ 

“Really, Cas. Why? Does God owe you any favours? Why should He have to speak to anyone? He made the world, He made everything: isn’t that enough?”

The angel cowered down, and I realised I had hurt him. I hadn’t meant to. Not really. 

“I just… want to know when I’m doing the right thing,” Cas said, pushing to his feet and making to leave. 

The right thing. Of course. A deal with the devil.

All for the Greater Good, of course. All for that.

But God wouldn’t have brought him back, if he didn’t believe in little old Thursday, would He? Of course not.

***

Of course the angel who rebelled would do so again. Of course bringing him back to life only reinforced his behaviour.

Or maybe it was a cry for help? Maybe he knew, deep down, that he was going too far when he lied, cheated and stole? When he betrayed first the humans, then the demon who was his partner?

Was that why Castiel did these things? To up the ante? To raise the bar?

To beg?

To cry: _eloi eloi lama sabachthani?_

He opened the door to Purgatory, and what came out was answer enough.

***

“I’ll be in touch,” Castiel said as he disappeared from my little home sweet home away from home. This RV was somewhat less than the manner in which I was accustomed to being kept, but it had served its purpose so far. 

I had heard (and seen) all the things the God-Castiel had done in the church, the man he had healed... I understood what he was trying to do. It was risky, letting him run about with all those Leviathans boiling inside of him, aching to come to the surface, to be set free. They were there like black smoke around his glorious blue light, and it hurt to look at him like this. My angel, corrupted.

But Castiel didn’t disappoint. His loyalty and dedication to do what was good, what was _right_ overcame those terrible creatures inside of him for the most part. I worried for his vessel: it wasn’t built to hold so many of them. My plan had perfectly calculated the amount of souls for each of us to boost power just enough to be held in our current vessels - meatsuits - whatever you want to call them.

I let him go, trying to right the wrongs of all of Creation. Watching him carefully as he did what he thought God would do - the old God - and I couldn’t make up my mind if I was proud of my angel or was pissed off that he was trying to take over Hell. _My_ Hell. 

I supposed it was only a matter of time until he either exploded under the weight of the Leviathans or - by some miracle - took over Hell and managed to heal himself or expel those nasty things once and for all. I’d have to sit back and wait. He said he had a plan for me. I guess I’d have to see what exactly it was.

***

_Gloria, hosanna in excelsis._

Angels sang in every tongue. They sang out for the word made flesh. God came down from on high and was born of the virgin bride. 

Glory upon him. All the choirs and all the spheres sang out in exultation.

God was born. God was human.

Castiel stared down at Him - the only time he had seen His face - and he saw the glow of Heaven behind the newborn baby’s squashed, pudgy, unformed features. It was strange to see Him thus. He had imagined God in all his glory so many times, but to see Him made manifest in humanity? It was surreal. It was like seeing God through smoke-strewn air, or through wave-ravaged surf.

God must love humans, to be born and die as He did.

God must love them very much.

Castiel watched the man die, and be reborn.

And that was the last anyone saw of Him.

***

Of course it was the Winchesters that were his Achilles Heel. One tall Moose in a cage, and one smarmy Squirrel who didn’t need him any more. That’s why he spoke to me. That’s why he acknowledged me. That’s how I got him to talk.

It should have hurt. It did, sort of. On one level. 

Castiel. The angel who loved the Winchesters enough to defy God. The seraph who stood up to two archangels at once - and was summarily destroyed - all for the hope that two brothers, a drunk and a car could keep the world spinning.

Free Sam. Give Sam back to Dean. And then they will love you. It was clearly how his mind worked, to begin with. Sam, Dean, Sam, Dean.

Amazing how ready he was to lie to them. The lengths he would go to to conceal our involvement. Even just from a logistics point of view.

Not that Sam or Dean would ever have approved of _me_.

Still.

It hurt.

***

Even though he’d been told God no longer cared, it did not stop Castiel. It did not stop him going up to the peaceful Heaven, the garden that reminded him most closely of what he imagined Eden would have been like.

He had not been made when Eden was still proud. He had come after. He would admit he was jealous of those that had seen it in its glory days, and of what they told him. It had been truly a beautiful sight. Everything was perfect, whole. The greens seemed greener and the blues seemed bluer than they did these days. Vibrant. Alive. 

Until Gadreel let the Serpent in. The Fall of Humanity.

These were the thoughts that plagued Castiel as he searched far and wide for God. But God wouldn’t be found, not that easily. He let someone know He was still alive, still kicking. He didn’t care about the Apocalypse being averted - not with this plot twist. 

But Castiel was not happy with this answer. He couldn’t understand why God no longer cared about the Apocalypse that was foretold. It was _His plan_. Since when did Heavenly prophecies change? 

Why didn’t God care that he had disobeyed? Lucifer had burned in Hell, and Gadreel had been imprisoned in Heaven. Castiel?

Castiel was resurrected. And Cas wasn’t sure why, or how he felt about that. He wanted to demand answers. He wanted to demand explanations. He wanted to know _what next_? The world was open. Too open. There was no path, there were no orders, and there was no logic. For millennia it had all made sense…

“Father,” he whispered, hands clasped before him. “If you ever loved us… please. We need you. _I_ need you.”

There was no reply. There was never a reply.

“I only want to do what’s right,” came the quiet, painful words. “Father… please…”

Silence.

“Why have you abandoned us…”

***

He did not know it, but I watched him. I watched him all the time. It was something of an obsession, I will admit. 

I loved him. My little angel. My little angel of Fuckups and Thursdays. That was him. He meddled and he connived and he rebelled and he cheated and he did all the wrong things, for all the right reasons.

You can live a blameless life without heart, you know? You can go through the motions and tick all the boxes because either you lack the ingenuity to break from the norm, or you balance out your books and want a good afterlife. You can smile and smile and be the villain. That’s selfish, you know. Doing it for the reward. 

Still. If you do no harm, how can you be punished for having no heart?

Castiel was the other way entirely. Castiel was _all_ heart. It was why he’d fallen for the Winchesters - for all of humanity, when it came down to it - and why he’d taken the opportunity to stick two fingers up at his older brothers.

And I loved him for it. I did. I truly, madly did.

He worked with the Devil and he prayed to God. He lied to his friends and he whispered his secrets to me in the dark. He rebelled. He disobeyed. He broke ranks. He threw everything to the wind. And what was it for? 

Love. It was all for love. When he stared at the world he saw the potential inherent in it. When he listened to humanity, he _heard_ their prayers and his heart was moved. When he saw them make mistakes, he didn’t think less of them as Lucifer had. No. He still loved them. He understood what it was to be imperfect. He knew that did not make you less.

I suppose it’s how he fell in love with me. He considered me broken, too. He considered me flawed. 

When he disobeyed, he did so because he wanted the Earth to keep on spinning. When he agreed to our Deal, he did so because he wanted to free his brethren, too. Oh. And he wanted his Winchesters back. And for them to love him. But who isn’t a little selfish, once in a while? As God he’d wanted to fill the gap he thought was left behind. He’d wanted to cure the sick, to reveal the lies, to lift people up. 

It is very hard to hate someone like that. It’s very hard not to love them, too.

***

From afar, where he thought he would not be seen, Castiel watched.

He had heard stories of this demon. Stories that he was one with his finger on the pulse. One who knew how to _acquire_ things. One of cunning and resolve. 

A demon, Castiel thought, still a demon, all the same. But if he was a means to an end, then he and the brothers would have to approach him and barter. They needed the Colt.

The angel watched as Crowley sealed the Deal. He could hear the conversation from where he stood, could hear how Crowley refused to let the bigoted man get his own way.

He did not know why. Was it one last insult? Was it to show how utterly the man was bought and sold? Or was he truly offended by the man’s ridiculous gender issues?

Castiel did not know. He told himself he did not care.

Demon.

Means to an end.

Smart or no, he had no soul. And therefore he should be of no consequence to anyone.

Except… as far as he was useful.

***

I sat on the plush leather couch I had brought in to replace the old, crappy one in the Men of Letters bunker, flipping through the boring basic channels on television. I could watch whatever I wanted, of course, but honestly, I was just biding my time until the inevitable angry angel showed up.

Not one to disappoint, he stood before me, glaring.

“You mind moving a bit to the left, sweetheart? You’re blocking the view,” I smirked.

“What the Hell do you think you’re doing, Crowley?” he said, clenching his fists.

“Currently, I’m watching a spot of news. Trying to see what’s going on in the great big world. But you make a better door than a window.”

“I meant with _Dean_.”

“Dean should be sound asleep of his own accord.”

“Crowley,” he growled, pulling me up by the lapels of my suit. “ _Why_ are you hunting with Dean?”

“Why are you _not_ helping with Abaddon?”

“Dean made the decision to leave Sam and I behind. I was looking after him because no one else was and he’s still not well, Crowley.”

I knew he wasn’t lying. I knew he really was looking after the Moose. And it only made me love him that much more. It was that much harder to stay mad at him. 

So I kissed him. Just like we used to, the way everything had started between us. The only thing missing was the wall behind me. 

He must have expected it - must have wanted it - because he knew that when he laid his hands on me like that… that there would only be one outcome. We were fools for one another. Always had been, always would be. As sure as night followed day, I loved Castiel. And Castiel loved me.

He held me back - at arm’s length - his blue eyes sharp with confusion.

“It’s okay,” I told him, my hands wrapping around the wrists that held me away. “It’s okay, Cas.”

“It is not--”

I ran my thumbs over the back of his hands. “It is.”

His head to one side - listening for an answer to his prayers, his desperate entreaties to Heaven - but none was forthcoming. No one ever told him what to do when he loved something unholy. Love was good and right and true. I was none of the above.

Least… not in his eyes, anyway. More honest than nearly anyone you could hope to meet, proud upholder of agreements and a million other notable qualities. Still. People tend to look at a demon and go: demon.

Funny.

If I was human, do you think they’d feel the same way? Do you think my good would outweigh the bad, if I still had a soul? I’m sure if you put me in the scales against a Winchester, you’d be hard pegged to work out where the balance would tip.

“Crowley--”

“You betrayed me. I know. And then we both did some things that are best not spoken of. But can’t we start again?”

My angel loved me still. I could feel it in the air. I could feel it in the way his Grace was shaking in his vessel. 

Oh, Castiel. My divine little bird. His heart knew what his head did not. His heart knew this was right. He knew _me_. He’d known _me_ , and not the labels, not the patina, not the display case.

We were not so different after all.

Funnily enough, he found a wall to slam me into, anyway. It took a bit more effort, but then he could press his lips to mine and we could say ‘I’m sorry’ with our hands and our lips instead of with broken words.

He loved me.

I loved him.

This would never change.

***

Castiel watched Dean. Dean with his perfect life. Dean with his happiness. Dean with all the things that Heaven and Hell had conspired to take away from him.

And Castiel felt guilt.

He was saving Sam, yes. Partially because he burned with horror at the thought of the torment the younger Hunter must be enduring, but partially because…

Without them, what did he have? Without them, who was he?

They had said that a Hunter could never go back to a normal life, could never retire and have a family.

It wasn’t true, though. Dean proved the lie. 

It wasn’t Dean who couldn’t give it up, it was Castiel.

The angel sat at the kitchen table as waffles were made around him. He listened to the sounds of domestic bliss and it hurt him, deep inside.

Dean, he wanted to say. Dean. I am here. I am back. I gave everything and somehow I was returned. I was returned and God does not care. I have nothing. I have no one. Half the angels want to follow behind me, and half of them want me dead.

And the only creature who seems to understand me is the King of Hell himself.

Dean, he wanted to say. Help me.

I am worried. I am afraid. I am alone. I am lost. I do not know what is right and what is wrong. I do not know what I should do. I do not know _who_ to be.

And I think I am falling for him. I don’t want to be - he is a demon! - but I think I am. I think I am falling in love with the way he looks at me like I am something worth looking at. I think I am falling for the way he smiles and listens to me. For the way he comforts me, and strokes his hands through my hair. The things he say sometimes make too much sense. More sense than Zachariah ever could.

Help me, Dean. Help me.

I no longer know what’s right.

I no longer know.

But the waffles were eaten, and the orange juice gulped, and the angel Castiel - once Cas, named by the man’s tongue - vanished.

***

“I… broke Heaven.” 

He confessed, at last, as we lay side by side on the bed. I wasn’t sure whose room it was and it was probably best I didn’t think too closely about it.

“I had heard a rumour. Care to share?”

His tongue wet his lips and sent a shiver down my spine. Not now. Not right now, Crowley. Later. All the time in the world for those lips, that tongue.

“I thought I was fixing it. I was tricked. Metatron… he cast all the angels out. He broke their wings. He… stole my Grace.”

“But you’re all Sparkly right now?”

His eyes closed in shame. Again, I was his confessional. His priest as well as his lover. 

“I stole it. I was… they were going to kill me. And I did not want to die. I stole a Grace, Crowley. The angel inside me is not me…”

I put my hand on his, and pulled it up to his vessel’s heart. “You are - and always will be - an angel. No matter what. Even with stolen Grace--”

“Crowley I don’t think--”

“No.” I put a finger on his lips. “Listen to me. You do things for love. You do some damnedly stupid things at times, I’ll agree… and they say that my doormat is literally made from good intentions, but…”

He wanted so very much to believe me.

“You’re a good person. I know. And for all you don’t like me saying so, God would not bring you back so often if He didn’t believe in you - in what you’re capable of - would He?”

“God is gone.”

“Don’t count him out so soon.”

He didn’t want to, but he nodded and agreed all the same.

***

You know, they say that God is Good. God is Love. God is all those wonderful things. But do they really understand the world? How can they? Only God can understand the entirety of Creation. Everything else is… lesser.

There can be only one God, you see. One Alpha and one Omega. One **I AM**. That’s how it works. 

Creation is more than just good and beauty. After all, before He set apart the Light from the Dark, what was there? Before Day and Night were rent asunder, they were merely parts of one Whole. 

Good is only Good when you have the choice to do Evil. Love is only Love when you also understand Hate. With no Down, there is no Up. There only Is.

That is what God Is.

 **YHWH.** I Am. 

I Am the stars that twinkle in the sky, that blaze and burn a million miles from here. I Am the darkness and the void between them - I Am the absence of light. I Am the laughter of a newborn babe, and I Am its cries of dismay and need. I Am the heat that burns within the sun, and I Am the dark space around that swallows the heat down whole. I Am there when two join hands and swear to never part. I Am there when the crockery slides down the wall. I Am there when a mother’s legs part and she _aches_ and in the sweat of her brow and the agony of her loins brings forth the next generation. 

I Am.

I Am the God who was made Flesh. I Am He who was born into this world and knew it as My children did. I Am He who felt God had forsaken him, and I Am God who did the forsaking, too. I Am He who suffered for your sins, and I Am He who made the first fruit, the first bite, the first Fall.

I Am.

Of course I came to the Earth as a child of Mary. How could I know what it was to be Human if I never had been? I Am in all things. And I love all things. I love all of my Creation. I broke My body and My heart, and I opened the doors anew to My Kingdom. I died for your sins.

And when I was born and died, and was born anew…

...there was one more thing left. I have been and Am God. I have been and Am Human. I have been and Am… the Devil.

Demons, too, are my children. All things are, and I love all. Demons - more so than Humans - needed my Love. They were given a choice and they made the wrong one, but do I damn them for all eternity? No. 

There must always be a choice.

Hell existed because of Me. 

And to understand it, to truly know My world, I must go there, too. I must go there and save those who were worthy.

God is Good.

God is also… less than Good.

I move in ways not so much mysterious as… complete.

You could never understand.

***

It came to this. I should have known. I _did_ know. Of course I knew. I always had.

It still hurt to witness. It still _stung_. 

My angel. My Castiel. My partner. My love. Here he was, throwing all our years of collaboration down the drain. Equal partnership. I’d kept every arrangement we’d brokered. I’d followed slavishly to the letters of his laws. I’d worked for him, and he’d worked for me.

Mutual benefit.

Happy endings.

All that jazz.

And what did he do? What did it come to, at the end of all things?

The angel betrayed the demon. The angel faithless. He stole the blood and he broke my heart.

(Knowing something will happen does not make it hurt less. I wished I could live forever in the days beforehand, wished I could put them on eternal repeat. Days of bliss and shared joy. Days of whispered darkness and love. Days of being _with him_.)

Even love was not enough to save us. Was not enough to save me from an angel’s caprice. He would defy Michael, Lucifer and God for humans who cared nothing for him.

But for a demon who loved him with all his - hah - heart and soul?

No.

And thus was Castiel’s own soul bought and sold. Not for thirty pieces of silver - not even for fifty pieces of gold - but for a thousand - a hundred thousand - blackened, dirty souls. 

I saw behind his eyes that he hated himself for doing it, but he did it all the same. 

Everyone has their price.

And without God - without Him there - Castiel was sure he had to rise up instead. 

Oh, my foolish angel. Did he not know that the Devil would come to tempt you in the desert? Did he not know that he would offer you that which you wanted most? Did he not know that this was how you were saved, or damned?

How ironic that his damnation would be to cast a demon aside.

Most would consider that salvation.

In this instance… 

Well.

***

I walked him around Hell. It was better these days. Organised. Progression. No more chaos. It was a well-oiled machine. Gone were the anarchic days of old, the chaos incarnate.

I was fixing it, by degrees. It was never going to be an easy task. 

I showed him, and I hoped he would understand. I hoped he would see through the surface, to the message written underneath. 

_I am fixing Hell._

Back then, I almost hoped he would say no. I almost hoped he would refuse. That he would stand up to Raphael alone. But we both knew that would be the death of him, even with the Winchesters. 

Neither of us wanted him dead.

And so: my Deal.

Purgatory.

A broken land with broken souls. Equal shares for both. It would fix his angel problem, and fix my demon problem. It would also mean Good and Evil and all that would remain on a level footing.

It was a stroke of genius, if I do say so myself.

It was also a test.

A test of faith.

A test of intent.

Of heart.

He said yes, in the end. You know, they almost always do. Once I see them, that is. I’m very persuasive, you see. I can sell snow to an eskimo, and then get him to thank me for it afterwards. It’s a skill. I have a cunning tongue.

The New God and the New Devil. Partners.

It was meant to be just business.

It was never going to be just business.

***

Here lay my angel, in my arms. Dead - again - as if it’s just a game to him. To see how many times he can break my heart. Doesn’t he know? Doesn’t he realise?

Abaddon is gone. I can feel it. I can feel the absence where once she was. The Winchesters got to her. She was too busy gloating over Castiel’s death and perhaps that was one thing too much for Dean.

I barely register it, though, because Castiel is here. Limp and lifeless. I put my hand on his forehead.

_And I know. I always know. But this time? This time he had died for **me**. The other times he’d died for Dean, for Sam, for humanity… because he loved them, my stupid angel. He loved them. But this time it had been thoughts of me as he perished. He’d charged her - wanting to win back Hell, wanting to give it to me, wanting me to be **safe** \- and the last thought in his mind had been that he’d failed me._

_Me. A demon. In his eyes, the lowest being imaginable. A creature of sin and ignominy. And yet he loved me all the same. He loved me and he wanted me to be happy and safe. He loved me, and he saw the good in me, and he knew. He knew, at last, the lesson that had been so long in the learning._

**“The King will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’...”**

I pushed Light and Heaven back inside my angel. I reached into the skies and I pulled down a star and I hitched it to his heart. I gave my angel back his Grace and his Glory, as I had done so many times before.

Castiel’s eyes opened and fixed on me.

And he remembered.

He remembered when I gathered the scattered pieces of him from where the archangel had spent him, and I pushed them back together and breathed air back into his lungs. He remembered when I found him torn apart by Leviathans and I held him until he stopped shaking, his mind broken from the horrors. He remembered, too, when I left a hole in Purgatory, through which I could guide him slowly home. My angel. My Castiel. 

At long last he had learned the lesson I knew he could. At long last did he realise that God had loved him all along.

“Crowley?” he asked, stirring in my arms.

“Yes, love.”

“But you--”

Every time you prayed, I heard. Every time you screamed my name, I listened. Every time you begged forgiveness, I gave it. Every time you needed help, I offered.

Every time you wanted my love, my presence, my voice…

...I was right here, Castiel.

“I love you,” I tell him, and I wipe at his bloodied brow with my hand.

It was all a test. It was all a lesson. It was all a way for him to truly _love_.

I pull him into my arms, and he comes willingly.

***

God is more than miracles, though He does miracles aplenty.

God made the Garden, but he also made the Serpent.

God made Adam, but he also made Lucifer.

God _is_ love, but love must be of the unlovely, too. Love must be of the dark spaces, of the faltering steps, of the broken hearts and the bad decisions.

Love is not pure, simple, true and easy.

Real love will cover the world.

Real love will cover Hell, as much as it will cover Heaven.

I love him.

And he loves me.

And I hear every. Single. Prayer.


End file.
